


Searching for Survivors

by Peppermint_Shamrock



Category: Star Wars - All Media Types, Star Wars: The Clone Wars (2008) - All Media Types
Genre: Gen, Mace Windu Appreciation, Serious Injuries
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-05-23
Updated: 2020-05-23
Packaged: 2021-03-03 00:47:30
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,094
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24342286
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Peppermint_Shamrock/pseuds/Peppermint_Shamrock
Summary: Mace Windu and his troops arrive too late to save the day, but they can help the survivors.Written for Mace Windu Appreciation Day.
Comments: 26
Kudos: 158
Collections: Jedi-Friendly





	Searching for Survivors

**Author's Note:**

> I'm not entirely satisfied with this, but I wanted to do something for Mace Windu Appreciation Day, so here's a short oneshot~

Mace Windu stood alongside his troops outside the ruins of what had once been a Republic outpost. They’d been called there to reinforce, or, if necessary, recapture the outpost that had been under sudden siege by the enemy forces. But they’d arrived too late, and it seemed that the Separatists hadn’t come to capture the outpost, merely to destroy it.

Was there any strategic value in that decision, or was it just the senseless destruction of war?

Mace didn’t have the time to ponder questions like that.

“Spread out, and check for any survivors,” he ordered his men. “And keep alert, in case the Separatists have left any surprises for us.”

He was met with a chorus of “yes, sir!”s, and the men began to fan out. But not all of them were so eager.

“Doubt they’ll be any survivors in there, sir. Not any that’ll make it out.”

Another trooper, Ember, cut in before Mace could respond. “See, Wither, this is why I said you should’ve called yourself Cynic.”

Wither turned and glared at his brother. It was a good glare, Mace thought, certainly living up to the man’s chosen name. It wasn’t the kind of glare that could stop a rampaging beast in its tracks, but Mace rather thought that most of the criminals and corrupt officials he’d arrested over the years could’ve taken a few pointers from Wither to really achieve the look they’d been aiming for when he’d put them in cuffs.

Ember, however, wasn’t quelled, though in Mace’s estimate, that spoke more to their familiarity than to the effectiveness of Wither’s glare. Still, they had work to be doing, so he spoke up before the conversation could continue.

“Troopers,” he said, and that was enough of a reprimand, but he continued. “If there _are_ survivors, we should find them, and if there are droids, we should deal with them.”

“Yes, sir,” Wither said this time. “Wasn’t disagreeing, just saying, sir.”

“Hmm,” Mace offered noncommittally. He knew Wither hadn’t meant any harm by it. “You two, go join the others at the left entrance. I’m going in through the top.” And with that, he began leaping up the structure, aiming for the gaping hole in the roof. His footfalls were light as he entered, not wanting to risk causing more damage to the precarious structure.

He navigated through the debris, looking for any signs of life as he made his way towards the outpost’s command center. There wasn’t much – only corpses and broken droids, crushed or shot. There were signs of lightsaber damage, too – and since no Jedi had been assigned here, that meant Ventress or Grievous (or possibly Dooku, though Mace doubted it) had been involved.

Aware of the possibility that they could _still_ be here, Mace quickly commed the troopers in charge of each search group to update them on that possibility, and he continued on.

The damage was worse in the command room, but it was there that Mace finally sensed a survivor. He pushed aside some of the larger obstacles with the Force, finding a trooper pinned down beyond them, but stopped short of freeing the pinned trooper as his eyes caught up with his instincts.

The trooper was pinned down, yes, but the piece of metal pinning him down was jammed through him – to free him like this would be to condemn him to a swift death by bleeding out.

Mace’s hands swept over his comm. “I need a medical team to report on my position.”

The unknown clone’s eyes fluttered open, and he gazed across the room, coming to a rest on Mace – his eyes glazed with pain, but lucid.

“No need for that, General,” he said weakly, “I’m done for regardless.”

“I’ll let the medics be the judge of that,” Mace said, moving carefully to the trooper’s side. “What’s your name, trooper?”

“Bloom, sir.”

“What happened here, Bloom?”

“Ventress,” Bloom said bitterly. “Caught us by surprise. She was looking for something – I think we received some data from some spies earlier, but I never saw the transmission myself. Whatever it was, the sergeant wiped the console right in front of her; never gave her a chance to get it. So Ventress brought down the whole place in retaliation. Don’t think she stuck around after that, but I got caught here,” he didn’t bother gesturing, “so I didn’t see much more.”

“You did well, trooper,” Mace said. “And your brothers’ sacrifice will be honored.”

“Whatever it was we were protecting, it should be worth it, if Ventress was that angry,” Bloom said.

Mace said nothing. The loss of so many lives was never “worth it”, but it was a reality of their situation, and lamenting it would not change anything.

The medical team arrived, falling into a semi-circle around their injured brother and Mace. One medic knelt down to examine Bloom more closely.

“Looks pretty unpleasant,” the medic said, “I’ve got a few ideas, but we’ll need your help, General.”

“Tell me what you need,” he answered.

The other medics brought out a heavy-duty tourniquet and positioned themselves as close as they could to Bloom. The first medic glanced over to Mace, indicating their readiness. Mace nodded, and reached out – with his hands, and with the Force. As quickly as he dared, he pulled the piece of metal out of Bloom, and the medics sprung immediately into fastening the tourniquet around him before he could bleed too much. Mace set aside the metal and helped them lift Bloom carefully onto a stretcher.

“It’ll have to do until we get him into surgery,” the medic said.

Mace went with them back down to the ground level, clearing the path for them while looking and sensing for any other survivors, and sent the medical team off with Bloom back to their transports.

He didn’t know what information had been sent here, and he didn’t think he would find out – he would bring it up with Republic Intelligence later, perhaps they could determine which spies had sent the information and why they had sent it to this outpost – but he knew he wouldn’t be part of that investigation. He didn’t know what could be done to prevent massacres like this from happening again. He couldn’t help the dead.

But Mace could help the living, so he turned around and went back inside, in search of more survivors. Because Mace and his troops had come, Bloom – and perhaps others – would live to see another day.

And that, at least, was something that could be called “worth it”.


End file.
